Disjunctive Soundscapes in Anne Carson’s The Trojan Women and H of H

Abstract

This essay examines two distinct modes of sonic disjunction in Rosanna Bruno and Anne Carson’s The Trojan Women: A Comic and Carson’s H of H Playbook. The Trojan Women shows how noticing sounds that are dislocated from expectations exposes hard truths about reality. H of H interrogates our “regular” mode of hearing other people and implies that there is a gap in how we can know others and know ourselves. Thus, though both are graphic texts, their power and effect are nonetheless garnered also through the sounds they describe and conjure in the minds of their readers.